Читать книгу: «The Diamond Throne», страница 2

He waited.

Then the gate creaked inward and the shadowy form of a porter, hooded in black, looked out. He nodded briefly, then pulled the gate wider to admit Sparhawk. The big knight rode into the rain-wet courtyard and slowly dismounted. The porter swung the gate shut and barred it, then he pushed his hood back from his steel helm, turned, and bowed. ‘My Lord,’ he greeted Sparhawk respectfully.

‘It’s too late at night for formalities, Sir Knight,’ Sparhawk responded, also with a brief bow.

‘Formality is the very soul of gentility, Sir Sparhawk,’ the porter replied ironically. ‘I try to practise it whenever I can.’

‘As you wish.’ Sparhawk shrugged. ‘Will you see to my horse?’

‘Of course. Your man, Kurik, is here.’

Sparhawk nodded, untying the two heavy leather bags from the skirt of his saddle.

‘I’ll take those up for you, my Lord,’ the porter offered.

‘There’s no need. Where’s Kurik?’

‘First door at the top of the stairs. Will you want supper?’

Sparhawk shook his head. ‘Just a bath and a warm bed.’ He turned to his horse, who stood dozing with one hind leg cocked slightly so that his hoof rested on its tip. ‘Wake up, Faran,’ he told the animal.

Faran opened his eyes and gave him a flat, unfriendly stare.

‘Go with this knight,’ Sparhawk instructed firmly. ‘Don’t try to bite him, or kick him, or pin him against the side of the stall with your rump – and don’t step on his feet, either.’

The big roan briefly laid back his ears and then sighed.

Sparhawk laughed. ‘Give him a few carrots,’ he instructed the porter.

‘How can you tolerate this foul-tempered brute, Sir Sparhawk?’

‘We’re perfectly matched,’ Sparhawk replied. ‘It was a good ride, Faran,’ he said then to the horse. ‘Thank you, and sleep warm.’

The horse turned his back on him.

‘Keep your eyes open, Sir Knight,’ Sparhawk cautioned the porter. ‘Someone was watching me as I rode here, and I got the feeling that it was a little more than idle curiosity.’

The knight porter’s face hardened. ‘I’ll attend to it, my Lord,’ he said.

‘Good.’ Sparhawk turned and crossed the wet, glistening stones of the courtyard and mounted the steps leading to the roofed gallery on the upper floor of the inn.

The inn was a well-kept secret that few in Cimmura knew about. Though ostensibly no different from any of dozens of others, this particular establishment was owned and operated by the Knights Pandion, and it provided a safe haven for any of their number who, for one reason or another, were reluctant to avail themselves of the facilities of their chapterhouse on the eastern outskirts of the city.

At the top of the stairs, Sparhawk stopped and tapped his fingertips lightly on the first door. After a moment, the door opened. The man inside was burly, and he had iron-grey hair and a coarse, short-trimmed beard. His hose and boots were of black leather, and his long waistcoat was of the same material. A heavy dagger hung from his belt, steel cuffs encircled his wrists, and his heavily-muscled arms and shoulders were bare. He was not a handsome man, and his eyes were as hard as agates. ‘You’re late,’ he said flatly.

‘A few interruptions along the way,’ Sparhawk replied laconically, stepping into the warm, candlelit room. The bare-shouldered man closed the door behind him and slid the bolt with a solid clank. Sparhawk looked at him. ‘I trust you’ve been well, Kurik?’ he said to the man he had not seen for ten years.

‘Passable. Get out of that wet cloak.’

Sparhawk grinned, dropped his saddlebags to the floor and undid the clasp of his dripping woollen cloak. ‘How are Aslade and the boys?’

‘Growing,’ Kurik grunted, taking the cloak. ‘My sons are getting taller and Aslade’s getting fatter. Farm life agrees with her.’

‘You like plump women, Kurik,’ Sparhawk reminded his squire. ‘That’s why you married her.’

Kurik grunted again, looking critically at his Lord’s lean frame. ‘You haven’t been eating, Sparhawk,’ he accused.

‘Don’t mother me, Kurik.’ Sparhawk sprawled in a heavy oak chair. He looked around. The room had a stone floor and stone walls. The ceiling was low, with heavy black beams supporting it. A fire crackled in an arched fireplace, filling the room with dancing light and shadows. Two candles burned on the table, and two narrow cots stood, one against either wall. It was to the heavy rack beside the single blue-draped window that Sparhawk’s eyes went first, however. Hanging on that rack was a full suit of armour, enamelled shiny black; leaning against the wall beside it was a large black shield with the emblem of his family, a hawk with flared wings and with a spear in its talons, worked in silver upon its face. Beside the shield stood a massive, sheathed broadsword with a silver-bound hilt.

‘You forgot to oil it when you left,’ Kurik accused. ‘It took me a week to get the rust off. Give me your foot.’ He bent and worked off one of Sparhawk’s riding boots and then the other. ‘Why do you always have to walk in the mud?’ he growled, tossing the boots over beside the fireplace. ‘I’ve got a bath ready for you in the next room,’ he said then. ‘Strip. I want to see those wounds of yours anyway.’

Sparhawk sighed wearily and stood up. With his gruff squire’s peculiarly gentle help, he undressed.

‘You’re wet clear through,’ Kurik noted, touching his Lord’s clammy back with one rough, callused hand.

‘Rain does that to people sometimes.’

‘Did you ever see a surgeon about these?’ the squire demanded, lightly touching the wide purple scars on Sparhawk’s shoulders and left side.

‘A physician looked at them. There wasn’t a surgeon handy, so I left them to heal by themselves.’

Kurik nodded. ‘It shows,’ he said. ‘Go and get in the tub. I’ll fetch something for you to eat.’

‘I’m not hungry.’

‘That’s too bad. You look like a skeleton. Now that you’re back, I’m not going to let you walk around in that condition.’

‘Why are you bullying me, Kurik?’

‘Because I’m angry. You frightened me half to death. You’ve been gone for ten years, and there’s been little news – and all of it bad.’ The gruff man’s eyes grew momentarily soft, and he roughly grasped Sparhawk’s shoulders in a grip that might have brought a lesser man to his knees. ‘Welcome home, my Lord,’ he said in a thick voice.

Sparhawk roughly embraced his friend. ‘Thank you, Kurik,’ he said, his voice also thick. ‘It’s good to be back.’

‘All right,’ Kurik said, his face hard again. ‘Now get in the tub. You stink.’ And he turned on his heel and went to the door.

Sparhawk smiled and walked into the next room. He stepped into the wooden tub and sank gratefully down into the steaming water. He had been another man with another name – a man called Mahkra – for so long now that he knew that no simple bath would wash that other identity away, but it was good to relax and let the hot water and coarse soap rinse the dust of that dry, sun-blasted coast from his skin. In a kind of detached reverie as he washed his lean, scarred limbs, he remembered the life he had led as Mahkra in the city of Jiroch in Rendor. He remembered the small, cool shop where, as an untitled commoner, Mahkra had sold brass ewers, candied sweetmeats, and exotic perfumes while the bright sunlight reflected blindingly from the thick, white walls across the street. He remembered the hours of endless talk in the little wine shop on the corner, where Mahkra had sipped sour, resinous Rendorish wine by the hour and had delicately, subtly, probed for the information which was then passed on to his friend and fellow Pandion, Sir Voren – information concerning the reawakening of Eshandist sentiment in Rendor, of secret caches of arms hidden in the desert and of the activities of the agents of Emperor Otha of Zemoch. He remembered the soft, dark nights filled with the clinging perfume of Lillias, Mahkra’s sulking mistress, and of the beginning of each day when he had arisen and gone to the window to watch the women going to the wells in the steel-grey light of sunless dawn. He sighed. ‘And who are you now, Sparhawk?’ he asked himself softly. ‘No longer a merchant in brass and candied dates and perfumes, certainly, but once again a Knight Pandion? A magician? The Queen’s Champion? Perhaps not. Perhaps no more than a battered and tired man with a few too many years and scars and far too many skirmishes behind him.’

‘Didn’t it occur to you to cover your head while you were in Rendor?’ Kurik asked sourly from the doorway. The burly squire held a robe and a rough towel. ‘When a man starts talking to himself, it’s a sure sign that he’s been out in the sun too long.’

‘Just musing, Kurik. I’ve been a long time away from home, and it’s going to take a while to get used to it again.’

‘You may not have a while. Did anyone recognize you when you rode in?’

Sparhawk remembered the fop in the square and nodded. ‘One of Harparin’s toadies saw me in the square near the west gate.’

‘That’s it, then. You’re going to have to present yourself at the palace tomorrow, or Lycheas will have Cimmura taken apart stone by stone searching for you.’

‘Lycheas?’

‘The Prince Regent – bastard son to Princess Arissa and whatever drunken sailor or unhanged pickpocket got him on her.’

Sparhawk sat up quickly, his eyes hardening. ‘I think you’d better explain a few things, Kurik,’ he said. ‘Ehlana’s the Queen. Why does her kingdom need a Prince Regent?’

‘Where have you been, Sparhawk? On the moon? Ehlana fell ill a month ago.’

‘Not dead?’ Sparhawk demanded with a sudden sinking in his stomach and a wrench of unbearable loss at the memory of the pale, beautiful girl-child with the grave, serious grey eyes whom he had watched throughout her childhood and whom, in a peculiar way, he had come to love, though she had been but eight years old when King Aldreas had sent him into his exile in Rendor.

‘No,’ Kurik replied, ‘not dead, though she might as well be.’ He picked up the large, rough towel. ‘Come out of the tub,’ he ordered. ‘I’ll tell you about it while you eat.’

Sparhawk nodded and stood up. Kurik roughly towelled him off and then draped the soft robe about him. The table in the other room was laid with a platter of steaming slices of meat swimming in gravy, a half-loaf of rough, dark peasant bread, a wedge of cheese, and a pitcher of chilled milk. ‘Eat,’ Kurik said.

‘What’s been going on here?’ Sparhawk demanded as he seated himself at the table and started to eat. He was surprised to find that he was suddenly ravenous. ‘Start at the beginning.’

‘All right,’ Kurik agreed, drawing his dagger and starting to carve thick slices of bread from the loaf. ‘You knew that the Pandions were confined to the motherhouse at Demos after you left, didn’t you?’

Sparhawk nodded. ‘I heard about it. King Aldreas was never really very fond of us.’

‘That was your father’s fault, Sparhawk. Aldreas was very fond of his sister, and then your father forced him to marry someone else. That sort of soured his attitude towards the Pandion Order.’

‘Kurik,’ Sparhawk said, ‘it’s not proper to talk about the king that way.’

Kurik shrugged. ‘He’s dead now, so it doesn’t hurt him, and the way he felt about his sister was common knowledge anyway. The palace pages used to take money from anyone who wanted to watch Arissa walk mother-naked through the upper halls to her brother’s bedchamber. Aldreas was a weak king, Sparhawk. He was totally under the control of Arissa and the Primate Annias. With the Pandions confined at Demos, Annias and his underlings had things pretty much the way they wanted them. You were lucky not to have been here during those years.’

‘Perhaps,’ Sparhawk murmured. ‘What did Aldreas die from?’

‘They say that it was the falling-sickness. My guess would be that the whores Annias used to slip into the palace for him after his wife died finally wore him out.’

‘Kurik, you gossip worse than an old woman.’

‘I know,’ Kurik admitted blandly. ‘It’s a vice I have.’

‘And then Ehlana was crowned Queen?’

‘Right. And then things started to change. Annias was certain that he’d be able to control her the same way that he’d been able to control Aldreas, but she brought him up short. She summoned Preceptor Vanion from the motherhouse at Demos and made him her personal advisor. Then she told Annias to make preparations to retire to a monastery to meditate on the virtues proper to a churchman. Annias was livid, of course, and he started to scheme immediately. The messengers were as thick as flies on the road between here and the cloister where the Princess Arissa has been confined. They’re old friends, and they had certain common interests. At any rate, Annias suggested that Ehlana should marry her bastard cousin, Lycheas, but she laughed in his face.’

‘That sounds fairly characteristic,’ Sparhawk smiled. ‘I raised her myself and I taught her what was appropriate. What is this illness of hers?’

‘It appears to be the same one that killed her father. She had a seizure and never regained consciousness. The court physicians all maintained that she wouldn’t live out the week, but then Vanion took steps. He appeared at court with Sephrenia and eleven other Pandions – all in full armour and with their visors down. They dismissed the Queen’s attendants, took her from her bed, clothed her in her state robes and put the crown on her head. Then they carried her to the great hall and set her on the throne and locked the door. Nobody knows what they did in there, but when they opened the door again, Ehlana sat on her throne encased in crystal.’

‘What?’ Sparhawk exclaimed.

‘It’s as clear as glass. You can see every freckle on the Queen’s nose, but you can’t get near her. The crystal’s harder than diamond. Annias had workmen hammering on it for five days, and they couldn’t even chip it.’ Kurik looked at Sparhawk. ‘Could you do something like that?’ he asked curiously.

‘Me? Kurik, I wouldn’t even know where to start. Sephrenia taught us the basics, but we’re like babies compared to her.’

‘Well, whatever it was that she did, it’s keeping the Queen alive. You can hear her heart beating. It echoes through the throne room like a drum. For the first week or so, people were flocking in there just to listen to it. There was even talk that it was some kind of miracle and that the throne room ought to be made a shrine. But Annias locked the door and summoned Lycheas the bastard to Cimmura and set him up as Prince Regent. That was about two weeks ago. Since then Annias has had the church soldiers rounding up all his enemies. The dungeons under the cathedral are bulging with them. That’s where things stand right now. You picked a good time to come back.’ He paused, looking directly into his lord’s face. ‘What happened in Cippria, Sparhawk?’ he asked. ‘The news we got here was pretty sketchy.’

Sparhawk shrugged. ‘It wasn’t much. Do you remember Martel?’

‘The renegade Vanion stripped of his knighthood? The one with white hair?’

Sparhawk nodded. ‘He came to Cippria with a couple of underlings, and they hired fifteen or twenty cutthroats to help them. They waylaid me in a dark street.’

‘Is that where you got the scars?’

‘Yes.’

‘But you got away.’

‘Obviously. Rendorish murderers are a trifle squeamish when the blood on the cobblestones and splashed all over the walls happens to be theirs. After I cut down a dozen or so of them, the rest sort of lost heart. I got clear of them and made my way to the edge of town. I hid in a monastery until the wounds healed, then I took Faran and joined a caravan for Jiroch.’

Kurik’s eyes were shrewd. ‘Do you think there’s any possibility that Annias might have been involved in it?’ he asked. ‘He hates your family, you know, and it’s fairly certain that he was the one who persuaded Aldreas to exile you.’

‘I’ve had the same thought from time to time. Annias and Martel have had dealings before. At any rate, I think the good primate and I have several things to discuss.’

Kurik looked at him, recognizing the tone in his voice. ‘You’re going to get into trouble,’ he warned.

‘Not as much as Annias will if I find out that he had a hand in that attack.’ Sparhawk straightened. ‘I’m going to need to talk with Vanion. Is he still here in Cimmura?’

Kurik nodded. ‘He’s at the chapterhouse on the east edge of town, but you can’t get there right now. They lock the east gate at sundown. I think you’d better present yourself at the palace right after the sun comes up, though. It won’t take Annias long to come up with the idea of declaring you outlaw for breaking your exile, and it’s better to appear on your own, rather than be dragged in like a common criminal. You’re still going to have to do some fast talking to stay out of the dungeon.’

‘I don’t think so,’ Sparhawk disagreed. ‘I’ve got a document with the Queen’s seal on it authorizing my return.’ He pushed back his plate. ‘The handwriting’s a little childish, and there are tearstains on it, but I think it’s still valid.’

‘She cried? I didn’t think she knew how.’

‘She was only eight at the time, Kurik, and quite fond of me, for some reason.’

‘You have that effect on a few people.’ Kurik looked at Sparhawk’s plate. ‘Have you had all of that you want?’

Sparhawk nodded.

‘Then get you to bed. You’ve got a busy day ahead of you tomorrow.’

It was much later. The room was faintly lit with the orange coals of the banked fire, and Kurik’s regular breathing came from the cot on the other side of the room. The insistent, nagging bang of an unlatched shutter swinging freely in the wind several streets over had set some brainless dog to barking, and Sparhawk lay, still half-bemused by sleep, patiently waiting for the dog to grow wet enough or weary enough of his entertainment to seek his kennel again.

Since it had been Krager he had seen in the square, there was no absolute certainty that Martel was in Cimmura. Krager was an errand boy and was frequently half a continent away from Martel. Had it been the brutal Adus who had crossed that rainy square, there would be no question as to Martel’s presence in the city. Of necessity, Adus had to be kept on a short leash.

Krager would not be hard to find. He was a weak man with the usual vices and the usual predictability of weak men. Sparhawk smiled bleakly into the darkness. Krager would be easy to find and Krager would know where Martel could be found. It would be a simple matter to drag that information out of him.

Moving quietly to avoid waking his sleeping squire, Sparhawk swung his legs out of the bed and crossed silently to the window to watch the rain slant past into the deserted, lantern-lit courtyard below. Absently he wrapped his hand about the silver-bound hilt of the broadsword standing beside his formal armour. It felt good – like taking the hand of an old friend.

Dimly, as always, there was a remembered sound of the bells. It had been the bells he had followed that night in Cippria. Sick and hurt and alone, stumbling through the dung-reeking night in the stockyards, he had half-crawled towards the sound of the bells. He had come to the wall and had followed it, his good hand on the ancient stones, until he had come to the gate, and there he had fallen.

Sparhawk shook his head. That had been a long time ago. It was strange that he could still remember the bells so clearly. He stood with his hand on his sword, looking out at the tag end of night, watching it rain and remembering the sound of the bells.

Chapter 2

Sparhawk was dressed in his formal armour, and he strode clanking back and forth in the candlelit room to settle it into place. ‘I’d forgotten how heavy this is,’ he said.

‘You’re getting soft.’ Kurik told him. ‘You need a month or two on the practice field to toughen you up. Are you sure you want to wear it?’

‘It’s a formal occasion, Kurik, and formal occasions demand formal dress. Besides, I don’t want any confusion in anybody’s mind when I get there. I’m the Queen’s Champion, and I’m supposed to wear armour when I present myself to her.’

‘They won’t let you in to see her,’ Kurik predicted, picking up his lord’s helmet.

‘Won’t let?’

‘Don’t do anything foolish, Sparhawk. You’re going to be all alone.’

‘Is the Earl of Lenda still on the council?’

Kurik nodded. ‘He’s old, and he doesn’t have much authority, but he’s too much respected for Annias to dismiss him.’

‘I’ll have one friend there anyway.’ Sparhawk took his helmet from his squire and settled it in place. He pushed up his visor.

Kurik went to the window to pick up Sparhawk’s sword and shield. ‘The rain’s letting up,’ he noted, ‘and it’s starting to get light.’ He came back, laid the sword and shield on the table and picked up the silver-coloured surcoat. ‘Hold out your arms,’ he instructed.

Sparhawk spread his arms wide, and Kurik draped the surcoat over his shoulders, then he laced up the sides. He then took up the long sword belt and wrapped it twice about his lord’s waist. Sparhawk picked up his sheathed sword. ‘Did you sharpen this?’ he asked.

Kurik gave him a flat stare.

‘Sorry.’ Sparhawk locked the scabbard onto the heavy steel studs on the belt and shifted it around into place on his left side.

Kurik fastened the long black cape to the shoulder plates of the armour, then stepped back and looked Sparhawk up and down appraisingly. ‘Good enough,’ he said. ‘I’ll bring your shield. You’d better hurry. They rise early at the palace. It gives them more time for mischief.’

They went out of the room and on down the stairs to the innyard. The rain for the most part had passed, with only a few last intermittent sprinkles slanting into the yard in the gusty morning wind. The dawn sky, however, was still covered with tattered grey cloud, although there was a broad band of pale yellow off to the east.

The knight porter led Faran out of the stable, and he and Kurik boosted Sparhawk up into his saddle.

‘Be careful when you get inside the palace, my Lord,’ Kurik warned in the formal tone he used when they were not alone. ‘The regular palace guards are probably neutral, but Annias has a troop of church soldiers there as well. Anybody in red livery is likely to be your enemy.’ He handed up the embossed black shield.

Sparhawk buckled the shield into place. ‘You’re going to the chapterhouse to see Vanion?’ he asked his squire.

Kurik nodded. ‘Just as soon as they open the east gate of the city.’

‘I’ll probably go there when I’m through at the palace, but you come back here and wait for me.’ He grinned. ‘We may have to leave town in a hurry.’

‘Don’t go out of your way to force the issue, my Lord.’

Sparhawk took Faran’s reins from the porter. ‘All right then, Sir Knight,’ he said. ‘Open the gate and I’ll go present my respects to the bastard Lycheas.’

The porter laughed and swung open the gate.

Faran moved out at a proud, rolling trot, lifting his steel-shod hooves exaggeratedly and bringing them down in a ringing staccato on the wet cobblestones. The big horse had a peculiar flair for the dramatic, and he always pranced outrageously when Sparhawk was mounted on his back in full armour.

‘Aren’t we both getting a little old for exhibitionism?’ Sparhawk asked dryly.

Faran ignored that and continued his prancing.

There were few people abroad in the city of Cimmura at that hour – rumpled artisans and sleepy shopkeepers for the most part. The streets were wet, and the gusty wind set the brightly painted wooden signs over the shops to swinging and creaking. Most of the windows were still shuttered and dark, although here and there golden candlelight marked the room of some early riser.

Sparhawk noted that his armour had already begun to smell – that familiar compound of steel, oil, and the leather harness that had soaked up his sweat for years. He had nearly forgotten that smell in the sun-blasted streets and spice-fragrant shops of Jiroch; almost more than the familiar sights of Cimmura, it finally convinced him that he was home.

An occasional dog came out into the street to bark at them as they passed, but Faran disdainfully ignored them as he trotted through the cobblestone streets.

The palace lay in the centre of town. It was a very grandiose sort of building, much taller than those around it, with high, pointed towers surmounted by damply flapping coloured pennons. It was walled off from the rest of the city, and the walls were surmounted by battlements. At some time in the past, one of the kings of Elenia had ordered the exterior of those walls to be sheathed in white limestone. The climate and the pervasive pall of smoke that lay heavy over the city in certain seasons, however, had turned the sheathing a dirty, streaked grey.

The palace gates were broad and patrolled by a half-dozen guards wearing the dark blue livery that marked them as members of the regular palace garrison.

‘Halt!’ one of them barked as Sparhawk approached. He stepped into the centre of the gateway, holding his pike slightly advanced. Sparhawk gave no indication that he had heard, and Faran bore down on the man. ‘I said to halt, Sir Knight!’ the guard commanded again. Then one of his fellows jumped forward, seized his arm, and pulled him out of the roan’s path. ‘It’s the Queen’s Champion,’ the second guard exclaimed. ‘Don’t ever stand in his way.’

Sparhawk reached the central courtyard and dismounted, moving a bit awkwardly because of the weight of his armour and the encumbrance of his shield. A guard came forward, his pike at the ready.

‘Good morning, neighbour,’ Sparhawk said to him in his quiet voice.

The guard hesitated.

‘Watch my horse,’ the knight told him then. ‘I shouldn’t be too long.’ He handed the guard Faran’s reins and started up the broad staircase towards the heavy double doors that opened into the palace.

‘Sir Knight,’ the guard called after him.

Sparhawk did not turn, but continued on up the stairs. There were two blue-liveried guards at the top, older men, he noted, men he thought he recognized. One of the guards’ eyes widened, then he suddenly grinned. ‘Welcome back, Sir Sparhawk,’ he said, pulling the door open for the black-armoured knight.

Sparhawk gave him a slow wink and went on inside, his mail-shod feet and his spurs clinking on the polished flagstones. Just beyond the door, he encountered a palace functionary with curled and pomaded hair and wearing a maroon-coloured doublet. ‘I will speak with Lycheas,’ Sparhawk announced in a flat tone. ‘Take me to him.’

‘But –’ The man’s face had gone slightly pale. He drew himself up, his expression growing lofty. ‘How did you –?’

‘Didn’t you hear me, neighbour?’ Sparhawk asked him.

The man in the maroon doublet shrank back. ‘A–at once, Sir Sparhawk,’ he stammered. He turned then and led the way down the broad central corridor. His shoulders were visibly trembling. Sparhawk noted that the functionary was not leading him towards the throne room, but rather towards the council chamber where King Aldreas had customarily met with his advisors. A faint smile touched the big man’s lips as he surmised that the presence of the young Queen sitting encased in crystal on the throne might have had a dampening effect on her cousin’s attempts to usurp her crown.

They reached the door to the council chamber and found it guarded by two men wearing the red livery of the church – the soldiers of the Primate Annias. The two automatically crossed their pikes to bar entry to the chamber.

‘The Queen’s Champion to see the Prince Regent,’ the functionary said to them, his voice shrill.

‘We have had no orders to admit the Queen’s Champion,’ one of them declared.

‘You have now,’ Sparhawk told him. ‘Open the door.’

The man in the maroon doublet made a move as if to scurry away, but Sparhawk caught his arm. ‘I haven’t dismissed you yet, neighbour,’ he said. Then he looked at the guards. ‘Open the door,’ he repeated.

It hung there for a long moment, while the guards looked first at Sparhawk and then nervously at each other. Then one of them swallowed hard and, fumbling with his pike, he reached for the door handle.

‘You’ll need to announce me,’ Sparhawk told the man whose arm he still held firmly in his gauntleted fist. ‘We wouldn’t want to surprise anyone, would we?’

The man’s eyes were a little wild. He stepped into the open doorway and cleared his throat. ‘The Queen’s Champion,’ he blurted with his words tumbling out over each other. ‘The Pandion Knight, Sir Sparhawk.’

‘Thank you, neighbour,’ Sparhawk said. ‘You can go now.’

The functionary bolted.

The council chamber was very large and was carpeted and draped in blue. Large candelabras lined the walls, and there were more candles on the long, polished table in the centre of the room. Three men sat at the table with documents before them, but the fourth had half-risen from his chair.

The man on his feet was the Primate Annias. The churchman had grown leaner in the ten years since Sparhawk had last seen him, and his face looked grey and emaciated. His hair was tied back from his face and was now shot with silver. He wore a long black cassock, and the bejewelled pendant of his office as Primate of Cimmura hung from a thick gold chain about his neck. His eyes were wide with surprised alarm as Sparhawk entered the room.

The Earl of Lenda, a white-haired man in his seventies, was dressed in a soft grey doublet, and he was grinning openly, his bright blue eyes sparkling in his lined face. The Baron Harparin, a notorious pederast, sat with an astonished expression on his face. His clothing was a riot of conflicting colours. Seated next to him was a grossly fat man in red whom Sparhawk did not recognize.